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Article contains graphic images
A mum has been warning people about chucking away their e-cigarettes properly after her son severely injured his foot by stepping on a discarded vape.
Samantha Bennett was told at one point that her son could need to have his foot amputated due to how serious his injuries were.
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On 8 October in Cirencester, Gloucestershire, her 13-year-old son Harley was out with his friends when he found a discarded Elf Bar vape on the ground and decided to stamp on it.
Standing the vape upright so he could stomp on it and crush it 'like a coke can', Harley brought his foot down and rather than being crushed as intended, the e-cig pushed up through the sole of his shoe, his sock and into the heel of his foot.
Seeing their friend struggling with his foot impaled by the vape, they called his mum who rushed to the scene and took Harley to hospital.
He received treatment at Cirencester Hospital before being rushed to the emergency ward at Gloucester Royal Hospital where he was placed on antibiotics and painkillers before going in for two hours of surgery and an attempted skin graft procedure.
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Samantha said the whole experience was terrifying and that doctors had never seen anything like it.
She said: "It was really shocking. I felt sick, scared, I didn't know what was going on. The hospital hadn't come into contact with anything like this before. It was the first they'd seen of it.
"It must have been very shocking for them as well. I had all the nurses asking to look at the pictures I had because they were so gobsmacked."
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"The size and width of the puff bar went the majority of the way in, and jammed into the top of the heel bone, which cracked it. It was a clean cut of flesh gone. Harley was actually quite calm, probably because the adrenaline kicked in and he wasn't feeling anything."
Things got even more scary when she was told there was a 'high chance' her son would need to have his foot amputated over concerns of an infection developing in the wound.
Although she felt 'terrified and sick', she kept her son's foot clean with fresh bandages every day and he is recovering, though the failed skin graft procedure means Harley will probably have a dip in his foot for the rest of his life.
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The 13-year-old said the whole thing had been 'very stressful' but luckily 'the pain is much better now' after he 'just stamped on it and it went straight into my foot'.
Pictures of the injury were shared on social media by Harley's grandmother Andrea Keen, with the family warning people to dispose of their vapes properly to avoid another nasty injury like the one he suffered.
The boy's grandma said he'd been wearing '£200 shoes with a really thick sole' which the discarded vape had punched right through.
ELFBAR told Tyla they were 'very sad' to hear of Harley's injury and said they 'call for people to dispose their vapes properly after finished using'.
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They said: "As a manufacturer, we pay much attention to protecting our environment by cooperating with our retailers, recycling departments, and authorities.
"Environmental responsibility is our top priority right now and we are in advanced discussions with one of the producer compliance scheme providers regarding the collection and sustainable disposal of our products across the UK."
They said the regulatory police for disposable vapes was 'still unclear' and that the 'reference to vaping is buried away', while stating that they were 'cooperating with recycling agencies'.
Joe Harker